Joshua Young (September 23, 1823 – February 7, 1904) was anabolitionistCongregational Unitarian minister who crossed paths with many famous people of the mid-19th century. He received national publicity and lost his pulpit for presiding in 1859 over the funeral ofJohn Brown, the first person executed fortreason by a U.S. state.[1][2] Contrary to his friends' expectations,[3]: 236 [4] his resignation under pressure in Burlington did not ruin his career; the church in Burlington later apologized and invited him back to speak[5] as "an honored guest."[6] There is a memorial tablet in the church.[7]
Young was also deaf. Abraham Willard Jackson, a contemporary Unitarian Preacher and deaf man said about Young, "In a Massachusetts village there toils a minister, and for more than a quarter of a century has toiled, though his deafness is so extreme that speech with him is scarcely possible, who once told me that in all these years no unpleasant reminder of his infirmity, either by act or word, had ever come to him from his people... I cannot think I need hesitate to say that my reference here is to Rev. Joshua Young, of Groton. With this testimony before them, all deaf people should pray for the prosperity of his church."[8]
Young was born in 1823 in Randolph, nearPittston, Maine, the youngest of eleven children of Aaron Young and Mary Colburn Young.[9] At about age 4 the family moved toBangor, where he attended local schools. At the age of 16 he enteredBowdoin College, where he was a member ofChi Psi fraternity, graduatingPhi Beta Kappa in 1845. He continued his studies atHarvard Divinity School, graduating in 1848. In 1890, he received the honorary degree ofDoctor of Divinity fromBowdoin College. He became aMason and was the chaplain of his local chapter.[10]He described himself as a "Garrisonian abolitionist".[3]: 235
In 1849 he married Mary Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Sylvanus Plympton, M.D., ofCambridge, Massachusetts.[11] Their children were: Mary Elizabeth Young Stevens (1849–1891), Lucy F. Young (1854–1922), Dr. Joshua Edson Young ofMedford, Massachusetts (1856–1940), Henry Guy Young ofWinchester, Massachusetts (1865–1936), and Mrs. Grace D. Patton ofBangor, Maine.[9]
1852–1862 First Congregational (Unitarian) Church,Burlington, Vermont.[13] His salary was $1,000, equivalent to $37,796 in 2024.[7]: 265 He was at first very popular, but began to lose popularity when parishioners learned that he had been on theBoston Vigilance Committee and shelteredfugitive slaves in his home. He was also accused by the church of doing the same in Burlington; the charge was not substantiated. In 1858, when he resigned his pulpit at the Burlington church, the church held a meeting to persuade him to withdraw his resignation, which he did.[14] He was also Superintendent of Common Schools in Burlington.[15] He resigned these positions in 1862.[16] There followed a year inDeerfield [Massachusetts].[9]
1864–1868 3rd Congregational Society,Hingham, Massachusetts. One source says his salary was $1,200 (equivalent to $24,125 in 2024),[17] another $1,500 (equivalent to $30,156 in 2024).[18] Between this position and the following one in Fall River he travelled to Egypt, the Holy Land, and Europe.[19]
Young described himself as "bred in the Garrisonian school of abolitionists".[3]: 235 His graduate school and his first call to the pulpit were in Boston, center of the Americanabolitionist movement and whereWm. Lloyd Garrison's newspaperThe Liberator was published. Young was a member of the Boston Vigilance Committee, set up after passage of theFugitive Slave Law of 1850 to helpfugitives avoidslave catchers. He saw the forced and public return of fugitiveAnthony Burns to slavery, and gave a sermon on it, published as a pamphlet.[22]
Young was also "a station-keeper on theUnderground Railroad when the blow at Harper's Ferry shook the whole nation like an earthquake".[3]: 635–636 He frequently sheltered fugitives himself.[23]: 45 In Burlington he was less than 50 miles (80 km) from the Canadian border. One account says that he sheltered up to six fugitives at a time in his "comfortable" barn.[5] Another source says that about 1850 fugitives appeared daily, and sometimes more than one a day, but then dropped to two or three afortnight.[23]: 81–82
The most significant event of Young's life, in his own judgment, was his participation in the funeral ofabolitionistJohn Brown, the consequences of which participation surprised and pained him. He often spoke about it and, as an old man, he wrote up his experience at length.[3]
Brown was executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia on December 2, 1859, afterhis conviction for murder, treason, and inciting a slave insurrection. Young had never met Brown, but when his abolitionist friendLucius G. Bigelow informed him thatJohn Brown's body was passing throughRutland en route to be buried at his home inNorth Elba, New York, only 100 miles (160 km) away acrossLake Champlain, they decided to attend.[3]: 236 They traveled all night and arrived only hours before the service began. As he was the only minister present (others had declined[5]), whenWendell Phillips asked him to preside, he said that he then "knew why God had sent [him] there".[3]: 239 The reporter present, who took it down "phonographically" (stenographically), called Young's impromptu opening prayer "impressive".[24]As the body was being lowered into the grave he felt moved to recite words ofthe apostle Paul: "I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith" (2 Timothy 4:7).
When he returned to Burlington, he found himself savagely attacked in the local paper. He was socially ostracized and snubbed and prominent members of his church resigned. Young said he was the victim of persecution.[25]
Honorable men there were who suggested it would be a spectacle not for tears to see me dangling at the end of a rope from the highest tree on the common, swinging and twisting in the wind.[6]
He was told that he would never again be permitted to occupy a pulpit.[26]
In a 2016 sermon on Young, Rev. Karen G. Johnston says, without explanation, "that there is dispute between Young's account, and that of the Burlington church, about what led to his leaving."[27]
Young presided over the 1899 ceremony in which ten of Brown's men, which had been buried elsewhere, eight of them thrown into two packing crates, were reburied next to John Brown's grave.[28]
Young, Joshua (February 11, 1872).The Tree Is Known by its Fruit. A Sermon Preached Feb. 11, 1872, in the Unitarian Church, Fall River.Fall River, Massachusetts.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
Young, Joshua (December 9, 1892).One hundred years of Old Colony Lodge A.F. and A.M. : Centennial celebration, Higham, Dec. 9, 1892.Hingham, Massachusetts: Old Colony Lodge.
In 2012, lines from Young's 1854 sermon “Come and See What It Is to Be a Unitarian" were used for responsive reading by Young's final parish, theFirst Parish Church of Groton.[29]
^Young, Joshua (December 9, 1892).One hundred years of Old Colony Lodge A.F. and A.M. Centennial celebration, Hingham, Dec. 9, 1892.Hingham, Massachusetts: Old Colony Lodge.
